Ch 24 Sem 2 Week 6 pt 1

Lola waited for Dark Lothario to contact her after her confrontation. She spent most of her free time at her lair in case he wanted to come to her in person, sitting at her desk with her school books, studying as though she were at the library or her own apartment. Several days passed before her phone rang with an unknown number coming up on the caller ID.

“Yes?”

“Dark Lothario requests an audience with you,” an unfamiliar voice said.

“Okay….”

“A location is being texted to you. Be there in one hour.” The line went dead, and a moment later the screen beeped an incoming text. The address was of the biggest, most expensive hotel in Acropolis. She felt very exposed when she entered the lobby with the high ceilings and open spaces. There were only a few people milling around, which made her feel even more vulnerable.

Her instructions told her to take the elevator to the top floor, which consisted of only one penthouse suite. Dark Lothario’s thugs were waiting for her when the elevator doors opened. She immediately went on guard, wishing she had brought Ratface and his guns with her, but all they did was usher her into the penthouse.

The space was modern, decorated in neutral colors and minimalist furniture. The living and bar area were huge, but she was led down a hallway to an office that reminded her a bit of her lair except more expensive, and Dark Lothario was sitting behind a desk just like her own. “Leave us,” he said to the guards, who backed out without a word.

“Something to drink?” he asked as he stood up and walked over to a small bar set into the wall.

“That’s okay.” He poured scotch for himself. “This is a nice place.”

“I own this hotel, after a fashion.”

“After a fashion?” she questioned.

“Under one of my identities, buried deep inside a real estate company. Somewhere in the mess I own it.” He took a sip of his drink. “I would have to talk to my accountant to figure out exactly how.”

“That’s great,” Lola said.

“So, little girl, you think that I am your father?” He wasn’t smiling, but she didn’t know what that meant.

“I have a hunch.”

“An educated guess, you mean.”

“So you were with my mom,” she said. He nodded and she felt something akin to both revulsion and eagerness. “I don’t look anything like her,” she said quickly. “She always said I looked like my father--”

“Yes, yes,” he studied her face. “But accusing someone of paternity is a messy business, and I think you went about it the wrong way, sending my best man to jail.”

“Your ‘best man’ smashed my face into the floor and tried to rape me.” Her voice was not as even as she hoped it would be, but she was fairly certain she found a flash of real emotion cross his face.

“I don’t do things that way.”

“I never said you did. But he did. You don’t want to be associated with someone like that, do you? It could make you look bad.”

“I am already bad. Alright. I will consider letting you work for me--”

“I’m no minion,” she said quickly. “I want the pay, all of the perks he had.”

Dark Lothario laughed. “I’ll let you work the Valentine’s Day event. We’ll see how it goes.”

“Which brings me to another thing--where’s Patricia?”

Dark Lothario left the room and she followed. Down the hall he took a key from his pocket and unlocked a door. Patricia was sitting on the bed, and at the sound her head turned. When she saw Lola her face broke into a smile and she rushed to her, wrapping her arms around Lola’s neck. “Thank god! After you left that last time they beat up that spider guy right in front of me. I was so worried when I heard that bastard blaming you, talking about wanting to kill you--”

Lola hugged Patricia back. She had cared about what might have happened to her, even though Lola hadn’t given her her freedom, though it was in her power to do so. At first she had just felt sorry for the other girl. Now she was fairly certain they were friends. And friends didn’t let other friends get seduced by their possible father.

“Your little friend goes free after Saturday night,” Dark Lothario said. “As long as things go smoothly. That’s your job. To make sure things go smooth.”

“Okay,” Lola said. “I can do that.”

Behind them a bell chimed. “And that’s Dr. Terrible here to collect DNA samples.”

“DNA?”

“You don’t think I’m not going to double check your ridiculous claims? Me a father!” He laughed as he disappeared into the hall.

“Are you okay?” Lola asked, turning her attention back to Patricia.

“Yeah. And you?”

Lola’s hand rose up to touch her cheek, now healed. “Fine. I took care of Spider.”

“I know--this place might be fancy, but the walls are as thin as any crappy apartment. He’s been raging about you for days.”

“Dark Lothario lives here?” Lola said, dropping her voice to a whisper.

“I don’t think so, but there’s another bedroom, and he’s definitely brought women over here at night.”

“Are you allowed out of this room?”

Patricia shook her head. “A bathroom connects to both rooms--three times a day someone leaves food in the bathroom for me, but I haven’t really seen anyone--just heard people talk. They’re going to film here,” she said. “And there’s going to be a big party and a live performance. I can’t do this--you can’t let him--”

Lola pulled her into another hug to whisper in her ear. “I’ll get you out. I promise.”

“Thank you.”

*****

Glory couldn’t get excited about Valentine’s Day that year. As a very popular girl in high school the day was full of flowers, chocolates, and silly cards from her friends, but knowing what would happen to the mayor’s daughter on Saturday hurt her deeply. She spent the days leading up to the event moping. Lola noticed. “It’ll be okay,” she told her when Glory came in after her last Friday class.

“It’s not okay,” Glory said, dropping onto the couch with her friend.

“I think it is.” She handed her a folded piece of paper. “This was under the door. It wasn’t postmarked so technically I did not tamper with the mail by reading it.”

Glory grabbed the letter away and unfolded it. It was typed, the font was Arial, which she hated (too plain), and there was no signature at the bottom.

Dear Glory,

Don’t be alarmed. I know who you are but I am not a threat to you. I know that you want to take down Dark Lothario. I don’t know if we can do that, but I do know how to get you into the party Saturday night so that you can get Patricia Wilkinson out. It will take place in the top floor penthouse at the Belmonte Grande--the fire stairs go all the way up but they can only be opened from inside the penthouse. There will be a man waiting for you in the stairwell with a key card. Don’t worry about him--he wont betray you, but if you are questioned by anyone later, his name is Roy Gillespie and he deserves anything that happens to him. Don’t feel guilty about giving him up to Dark Lothario if you need to save your ass.

The party starts at eight with the ‘deflowering’ scheduled for midnight. Patricia is being kept in the second bedroom on the right. The wait staff will be wearing black vests and red bowties. I suggest you wear a wig.

Love,
The Mistress of Minds

Glory read the letter twice before she looked up at Lola. “She wants me to break into the party and get Patricia out.”

“I know--I read it.”

“How am I going to do that?”

“Tomorrow we’ll go out and get you a good wig and a black vest. I’ll loan you the money.”

“I can’t walk into a Dark Lothario party without a mask and kidnap his kidnap victim!”

“Why not?”

Glory sighed. “I can’t do it alone.”

“Are you going to tell Valkyrie?”

Glory shook her head. If she told Valkyrie she wouldn’t let her go, and she needed to go. “Give me the phone,” Glory said. Lola passed it over to her. She dialed KP first. “Ever want to crash a Dark Lothario party?”

******

Lawrence sat silently in his desk chair staring at the calculus book open in front of him, but he wasn’t paying any attention to the book. America had ordered him, Torch, and Black to meet her at the loading dock at Memorial Hall. Dark Lothario. He so wasn’t ready for that.

He heard a key in the lock and Torch came in. “You look like your book just told you someone died,” he said. The keys hit the floor. “Did someone die?”

“I hope not,” Lawrence answered. “America wants us to crash Dark Lothario’s Valentine’s party and rescue the mayor’s daughter.”

“We can’t do that. We don’t have the training.”

“And yet,” Lawrence said. “C’mon. We’re supposed to meet her at Memorial Hall. We gotta talk her out of this.” Lawrence grabbed up his coat and they went back out.

America was already there with Black when they showed up, and they had been talking. Lawrence did not like the determined look on Black’s face. “You can’t be serious,” Lawrence said when he saw them. “We can’t go barging into Dark Lothario’s party like this. How do you even know where its going to be?”

“Roy Gillespie,” America answered immediately, and continued on despite the confusion the name brought to everyone. “He’s going to let us in. All we need are disguises. My roommate is out getting us uniforms to blend in with the wait staff.

“You’re forgetting one thing,” Torch said. “We’re supposed to be in masks. We’re not supposed to fight crime without a teacher. We can’t go off doing this.”

“I have to,” America said. “I saved one of his victims in December--this is my fight.” She grabbed her red mask and pulled it off in a sweeping movement, and Lawrence couldn’t help but stare. She’d always been beautiful, but seeing her entire face…wow. “If you don’t want to help me, fine. Just don’t say anything to anyone, okay?”

Torch remained silent. “If you don’t come back out, I’m letting the League know.”

“I’m in,” Black said immediately, whipping off his sunglasses. Behind them his eyes were vivid green, and he looked…older. “Lets get that girl out of there.”

Lawrence started at them, so determined, strong, ready to fight against evil for what was right. He didn’t feel that determination, just a sick feeling that if he went in there with them, something terrible would happen. He wasn’t ready. He thought of his calculus book back on his desk. That was what he should be doing. Not this. This was ridiculous. It was crazy. He looked over at America.

It was what she believed in.

“Okay,” he said. “But if we can’t do it, we sneak back out again. Dark Lothario never kills any of his victims, so if we can’t do it, we gotta drop it. The girl will survive, and I don’t want you to get hurt. Okay?”

“Okay.” She gave him a short nod, and with a sigh he pilled off his mask. America smiled a little. “You do have a baby face, don’t you?”

“I can change my mind,” he threatened.

“Change your minds about what?” The voice called out from behind them, and Lawrence immediately let out a breath of relief. They had been busted, and there was no way Captain Righteous wasn’t going to squeal on them. “Hey,” Righteous said, slowing down his walk towards them. “Are you--where are your masks?”

America rushed forward, grabbing Captain Righteous by the forearms. “You can’t say anything--swear you wont.”

“America, is that you?”

“Of course it is you idiot!”

“What are you doing?”

“Nothing concerning you,” Black said, stepping forward. “We saw how helpful you were last time.”

“Last time what?”

“Being too much of a coward to bend the rules and help out. Patricia Wilkinson is in this mess because you chickened out. And now we have to fix it.”

Righteous stared at America. “You’re going to rescue the mayor’s daughter?” She nodded. “America, that’s stupid.”

“Not if you come too.” Lawrence watched in disbelief as America ran her hands up Righteous’ built arms. “You’re so strong and fast--we’ll have no trouble getting in and out with you there to help us.” She looked up at him and actually batted her eyes at him. Lawrence turned away in disgust, and Torch grabbed him by the arm. If it was meant to comfort, it didn’t work. He turned back--America was staring up into Captain Righteous’ eyes now. “This is bigger and more important than our training. This is about making a difference and saving the girl. Like we weren’t able to before.”

“And if you don’t do it, you’re a bigger coward than I thought,” Black added.

Righteous glared at Black, and Lawrence’s jealousy burned as Glory continued to hold him by the arms. “I’m in,” he said, ripping off his mask to reveal his perfectly sculpted face--Lawrence didn’t stand a chance.

America let out a small squeal of excitement and gave Righteous a hug, further injury as far as Lawrence was concerned. “Okay boys,” she said. “We have a lot of planning to do.” She stepped away from Righteous and snatched her phone out of her pocket. “Hey,” she said when the person on the other line picked up. “We’re going to need one more outfit. What size?” The measuring look she gave Righteous made Lawrence want to spew. “Broad.”

*****

A/N:
Two posts in one week! Shocking! This chapter is probably going to be close to double length when I’m done, but I don’t want you guys to have to wait, being as I’ve been so bad at updating these days, so you are getting it in two parts--hopefully I’ll have the other half up before the end of the week, but I have a date with the Spanish Inquisition, so who knows.

If Glory and Righteous are a surprise, they are to me too, but it makes sense. The second half of the story has had some major revamps from what I started out with last fall. It has been nothing but issues ever since. My biggest problem I think is the pacing, but there’s really nothing I can do about it right now. You guys will have to tell me how it works as we get towards the end. (9 more chapters after this one, which feels a little weird since this is kind of climax-y, but I assure you it’s not.)